On the heals of four days of global solidarity and support for alleged Wikileaks whistleblower, Pfc. Bradley Manning, Activist San Diego dedicates our September General Meeting to the courage of whistleblowers and transparency activists.

Monday September 20, 2010 7:00pm

Joyce Beers Community Center in Hillcrest (4065 Vermont St. San Diego, CA 92103)

5th April 2010 10:44 EST WikiLeaks has released a classified US military video depicting the indiscriminate slaying of over a dozen people in the Iraqi suburb of New Baghdad -- including two Reuters news staff.

Reuters has been trying to obtain the video through the Freedom of Information Act, without success since the time of the attack. The video, shot from an Apache helicopter gun-sight, clearly shows the unprovoked slaying of a wounded Reuters employee and his rescuers. Two young children involved in the rescue were also seriously wounded.

On July 6, 2010, Private Bradley Manning, a 22 year old intelligence analyst with the United States Army in Baghdad, was charged with disclosing this video (after allegedly speaking to an unfaithful journalist). The whistleblower behind the Pentagon Papers, Daniel Ellsberg, has called Mr. Manning a 'hero'. He is currently imprisoned in Kuwait. The Apache crew and those behind the cover up depicted in the video have yet to be charged. To assist Private Manning, please see bradleymanning.org.

Organizations from all parts of the San Diego progressive community are signing on in solidarity with Bradley Manning and are calling for his release. We hope that your group is the next to sign on!

We, the Undersigned, call for the immediate release of US Army PFC Bradley Manning, incarcerated as of 18 June 2010.

Media accounts state that Mr. Manning was arrested in late May for allegedly leaking the video of US Apache helicopter pilots killing innocent people and seriously wounding two children in Baghdad, including those who arrived to help the wounded. The video was released by WikiLeaks under the name "Collateral Murder". Pfc. Manning is also identified by the Defense Department as a "person of interest" in the investigation into WikiLeaks obtaining 90,000 battlefield reports describing thousands of civilian deaths inflicted by occupation forces in Afghanistan, collusion with warlords, corruption and an unvarnished view of our decade-long war.

If these allegations are untrue, we call upon the US Department of Defense to release Mr. Manning immediately.

If these allegations ARE true, we ALSO call upon the US Department of Defense to release Mr. Manning immediately.

The leaked video, released by WikiLeaks under the title Collateral Murder, clearly shows that official statements from the multinational force in Baghdad that "there is no question that Coalition forces were clearly engaged in combat operations against a hostile force" were blatantly false. The leaker of this video blew the whistle on two crimes: the murder of civilians and an official coverup. Exposing these crimes was a moral and legal obligation and a service to the international community. The leaker deserves our respect and thanks—not prosecution.

We express our support for Mr. Manning in any case, and our admiration for his courage if he is, in fact, the person who disclosed the information. Like in the cases of Daniel Ellsberg, W. Mark Felt, Frank Serpico and countless other whistleblowers before, government demands for secrecy must yield to public knowledge and justice when government crime and corruption are being kept hidden. If the United States government demands to use our tax dollars and our own children to fight this war, then we must demand full disclosure of the facts, no matter how unsettling. We demand that the government stop the misinformation and we honor heroes who fight for transparency.

Free Bradley Manning!

Sincerely,

San Diego Coalition for Peace & Justice (SDCPJ)

San Diego Alliance for marriage Equality (SAME)

Activist San Diego

San Diego Branch of The International Socialist Organization (ISO)

Green Party of San Diego

San Diego Pride at Work

Progressive Democrats of America Metro San Diego Chapter (PDA)

Democracy for America San Diego Meetup

San Diego Chapter of Veterans for Peace (VFP)

Vietnam Veterans Against the War San Diego (VVAW)

The San Diego Puppet Insurgency

Mark Gabrish Conlan and Zenger's Newsmagazine

San Diego Military Counseling Project, a member group of the G.I. Rights Hotline